ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, January 17, 1997 TAG: 9701170044
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 2 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: RENNEE GRAHAM THE BOSTON GLOBE
With ``60 Minutes,'' CBS pretty much invented the television newsmagazine nearly 30 years ago. Since then, a bevy of magazine-style news shows have tried to duplicate or dethrone producer Don Hewitt's evergreen creation.
Hence, we've had the hip version, CBS's ``West 57th''; the human-interest, consumer-friendly newsmagazine, ABC's still-running ``20/20''; and the Hydra-headed newsmagazine, ``Dateline NBC,'' which seems to be on nearly every night of the week.
``Coast to Coast,'' CBS's latest entry, strives to be the feel-good newsmagazine. There are no nasty stories about corrupt companies manufacturing dangerous products, no reports on smooth-tongued dictators methodically crushing their people. Instead, we get ``a journey to the heart of America'' to see ``the stories we don't normally see,'' stories of ``unexpected heroism, inspiring courage and extraordinary ingenuity.''
Are you choked up yet?
The show's correspondents - Bernard Goldberg, Peter Van Sant, Vicki Mabrey, Cynthia Bowers and Alison Stewart, formerly of MTV News, are called ``storytellers,'' because their job is to weave fantastic stories off the beaten path about the wonders of the human spirit.
In other words, city folk need not apply.
The biggest city visited in this premiere is Tucson. Contributor Steve Hartman grabs a hidden camera, not to expose deception or corruption, but to see just how honest people are. Riding up to a stranger, he asks them to watch his bike while he goes to the restroom; then, he sends someone to steal the bike to see if the stranger will ward off the thief.
Time and time again we see good folks fighting the good fight against petty crime. Of course, one can only wonder how a similar scene would have played out in New Orleans or Los Angeles where good Samaritanism holds no truck against self-preservation.
Then we're whisked off to Idaho to see a farmer who trains newborn sandhill cranes to migrate over the Rocky Mountains with his ultra-light airplane as a guide. The third piece concerns St. Louis psychiatrist Carol North, whose personal history of mental illness helps her with her own patients.
If you are sensing a pattern of rampant do-goodism here, you've gotten the point of ``Coast to Coast,'' the newsmagazine with a smile and story on its lips.
The best story from the premiere show this week concerned a man more likely to have a sneer and a swear on his lips. He was Edward Hanna, a multimillionaire who also happens to be the profane, abrasive and dictatorial mayor of his broken-down hometown, Utica, N.Y. Hanna browbeats and bullies everyone from business people to council members. The city's belltower chimes every hour on the hour with Hizzoner's special request, ``My Way.'' He's an irascible character who insists his only mission is to restore Utica's long-faded glory and prosperity.
There's nothing wrong with a show dedicated to good news - hey, anything other than Simpson trial updates is like manna from heaven - but ``Coast to Coast'' is inebriated, and ultimately undermined by its folkiness. With its soundtrack full of banjos and fiddles, and endless shots of diners and roadside neon signs, you half-expect the ``Dukes of Hazzard'' to be correspondents.
``Coast to Coast'' strives to be as down-home and folksy as a plate of grits. And, at least for this critic, it's just as hard to digest.
LENGTH: Medium: 65 linesby CNB